


like a fifth avenue diamond

by clairelutra (exosolarmoon), volpish



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: (except innocently lmao), Draw Me Like One of Your French Girls, F/M, Gen, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-18
Updated: 2018-09-18
Packaged: 2019-07-13 21:16:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16026131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/exosolarmoon/pseuds/clairelutra, https://archiveofourown.org/users/volpish/pseuds/volpish
Summary: Rayla wants to know why Callum keeps studying her over the top of his sketchbook. The answer is fairly obvious, but the results of it are not—at least, not to Rayla.





	like a fifth avenue diamond

**Author's Note:**

> my soul: sold
> 
> these kids are *adorable*

"Look, if there's somethin' you wanna say, then just _say_ it," Rayla snapped after the third _day_ of Callum sneaking glances at her from over his sketchbook.

"Um, what?"

They were making their way through a mountain pass on the backs of horses, which left them with a lot of time to do nothing. Sometimes they talked, but mostly they just rode in silence, nothing but the clip-clop of hooves in the spaces between.

And, in Callum's case, stared holes into the backs of innocent friends' heads.

She crooked an eyebrow at him, unimpressed, and he faltered, lowering his sketchbook.

"I... I don't really have anything," he said helplessly, lifting his shoulders in a shrug.

Seemed honest enough. "Then why?"

"Why what?"

Rayla's already-frayed patience dwindled a little more. _"Why_ do y' keep _starin'_ at me like that?"

Callum flinched like she'd caught him at something. _No duh._ "Oh. Uh. I. Um."

She narrowed her eyes.

"Iiiii..." He trailed off with a wince and glanced away. "I was drawing you." Then, hurriedly, "You gotta look at people if you wanna draw them, y'know?"

Rayla did know that, actually. She was just too startled to offer a comeback.

He glanced at her and immediately held his hands up in awkward surrender, his expression in the vein of 'mortified' but not quite there. "Sorry! You're a good subject."

Clip-clop-clip-clop-clip-clop...

"Oh." It was nice to hear, she supposed. If she drew more often, she guessed humans with their extra fingers and round ears and brown eyes would make good subjects too.

She wished it involved less staring, though. This was just _awkward._

"Here," he said, and offered her the sketchbook. "See?"

She accepted it, letting her eyes fall to the top page...

And she blinked.

He hadn't been _lying_ , per se, but the girl on the page—that wasn't _her_ , was it? Sure, that was her warrior's ink and the style of her hair and even her height and body type and facial structure, but.

The girl Callum had been drawing was _cute_.

She was vivid and lively and _pretty_ , smiling wistfully with her head pillowed in her arms in one study, standing tall and strong in another. She held up her flopping five-fingered human gloves with a grin, she laughed with Ezran on her shoulders like she didn't have a care in the world, she hung up their pack with one foot resting idly behind the other, looking pensive and _beautiful_. The girl even managed to make scowling over her camp bowl and slouching in her saddle look cute somehow.

She looked like Rayla, it was true, but Rayla had never smiled like _that_ had she?

She just wasn't... _like_ that. She was grumpy and morose and plain. Kinda scrawny, kind of a spitfire. All her assets were in her fighting skills, and she was okay with that. She'd never have boys tripping over themselves for her attention, but she had the best weapons off old blacksmith Laanere's rack, and knives were much more useful than boys.

There was one sketch that was just the line of a jaw, curtained by fine, pale hair, featuring the curve of her mouth and the tip of her nose just visible.

Just the sight of it made Rayla feel like someone was holding a sunstone to her face, a storm of moon moths in her stomach.

The girl had her form, but it wasn't really her, right? It _couldn't_ be.

There were other sketches where she was grumpy and morose and scrawny and a spitfire, but even _they_ were cute. The curve of her horns ever graceful, her mouth expressive, subtle confidence and surety in her every move.

Rayla shoved the sketchbook back into Callum's hands, nudging her horse to drift away from his. She felt like she'd _swallowed_ the damn sunstone.

"What—"

"I don't look anythin' like that," she muttered, forestalling the question, gruff and awkward and horribly, _horribly_ self-conscious.

"Oh, uh..." His gaze burned into her already-burning cheek, and she fought off the intense urge to get off her horse and crawl under a rock. "...Sorry. A-about that."

"I dunno," Ezran put in, his horse _clip-clop_ wandering up to Callum's other side. "Sure looks like you to me."

Rayla flinched. Glancing over, she found them holding up the sketchbook to compare.

"I mean, art isn't perfect," Callum said a little helplessly. "But I _thought_..."

"You got it," Ezran reassured him, like he was just stating the facts.

"I'm..." Rayla scrambled silently for the right words. "I'm not that pretty."

The boys were staring at her with matching frowns.

"Uhh..." said Ezran.

"Yeah, you are," said Callum, like it was no big deal and he was wondering why it wasn't obvious.

Rayla didn't have a reply for that. The sunstone she's accidentally swallowed was trying to melt her from the inside out.

Hesitantly, Callum asked, "Hey, uh... are you okay?"

She jolted ramrod straight in her saddle. "'M fine! Good! Even great!"

She was not fine. She wanted to _die._

"We should keep goin'! On this road. With all the... all the trees... and rocks... and things. Fun, fun things."

She _really_ wanted to die.

"Oh-... kay?" said Ezran, and out of the corner of her eye, Rayla could see Callum shrug.

"Then... let's go, I guess?" said Callum, nonplussed.

She took a very deep breath, held it, and let it go.

It only helped a little bit.

"Right."

Now armed with the knowledge that she was, well, _pretty_ , Rayla spurred her horse into a trot so she could blush her ears off in peace.

**Author's Note:**

> [currently looking for TDP prompts, btw~](clairelutra.tumblr.com/ask)


End file.
